


No Company But His Sins

by KHansen



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Gothic, M/M, Writing Exercise, witchertober 2020
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:01:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 11,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26761048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KHansen/pseuds/KHansen
Summary: “We could go to the coast.”The witcher swallows, leather groaning as he balls gloved hands into tight fists. The air is heavy, damp and weighed down by the impending threat of a monsoon. The churning clouds rumble, lightning gilding the edges of the storm with diamonds. The gull cries again, its white body floating on the updraft. The witcher’s hollow eyes track it and his hands relax again.--31 Witchertober Prompts to be filled in 500-ish word snippets over the month of October.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 25
Kudos: 60





	1. The Coast

**Author's Note:**

> [Witchertober Prompts](https://bamf-jaskier.tumblr.com/post/630799461708382208/so-just-in-case-anyone-wants-a-prompt-list-for)

A biting wind snags and whips long hair around a pale face. Eyes the color of molten gold glitter amongst the filthy gray strands as the man -- the witcher -- stands against a stormy sky. His black armor makes him the perfect shadow as he stands at the edge of a grassy cliff, the sod filled with sand that showers down the cliff face with each howling gale. The clouds gathered overhead are dense and gray, almost black against the wine dark sea that roils and writhes along the beach. 

White foam decorates the shore, froth beaten mercilessly into each ebbing swell that drags itself up the darkened sand. A lone gull cries out somewhere, shattered voice lost in the wind. Sea spray fills the air with bitter salt, a familiar scent to the witcher, more familiar than it should be for a man who rarely visits the sea.

_ “We could go to the coast.” _

The witcher swallows, leather groaning as he balls gloved hands into tight fists. The air is heavy, damp and weighed down by the impending threat of a monsoon. The churning clouds rumble, lightning gilding the edges of the storm with diamonds. The gull cries again, its white body floating on the updraft. The witcher’s hollow eyes track it and his hands relax again. 

A single drop falls and lands on the toe of his boot, sitting perfectly spherical upon the worn leather. Another falls. It splashes on a stone, staining the rock with water. 

The witcher unbuckles the old metal of his swords, letting them clatter carelessly to the ground at his side. He strips off his armor, dropping each piece into the sandy grass at his feet. As the rain steadily falls, rolling down his skin and wetting his wild hair, he strips. He strips and strips and strips away the layers he should have pulled back and thrown away years ago --  _ decades _ ago.

He strips until there’s nothing, scarred flesh bared to the world. His skin pimples with the chill of the heavy downpour, the ice of his actions and decisions. Water streams into his eyes, down his arms. It drips from his fingertips, pools beneath his feet, and he lets his mouth drop open as his head falls back. He turns his face away from his mistakes, letting the rain cleanse them from his iniquitous soul.

_ “Get away for awhile.” _

The pressure that has been depressing his lungs, choking his throat and burning his eyes, alleves only the smallest amount. His breathing is still restricted by invisible hands that grip him in a vice, his thoughts are still stained by unshed tears that sting his golden eyes, but the black miasma in his mind lightens to a gray as dark and volatile as the storm. As he lets the shower wash away the heaviest of his burdens, others jump to the surface, turning his tremulous ruminations ugly. 

Heat rises to his face, grief pressing at his closed lids and reddening his scleras. Shame constricts his ribs and twists his stomach. His face crumples like rice paper against the rainfall. It’s not fair. He should have done so many things differently. But he didn’t and now he’s at the coast; with nothing but his sins to keep him company.


	2. Oxenfurt

The bustle of people isn’t unusual in a place such as this. Hundreds of feet shaking the ground, the swishing of skirts and pants filling the space near the cobblestone. The din of chatter, of dozens of voices overlapping and overwhelming fills the air. There’s the clatter of wagon wheels, the clopping of hooves; the spicy aromas of bakery goods. 

Colors fill the market: green and gold and blue and red. Brown aprons and indigo doublets, blond hair and leather shoes. Baskets on hips and packs on backs and instruments, instruments, instruments. Everywhere one turns there’s a musician.

A flutist tootles on the corner, a lutist strums in the park, a cellist bows at the tavern, a pianist crescendos from their room. It’s unsurprising yet wholly new and wonderfully noisy as melodies clash and mingle and mix and bend to one another as each instrument, each troubadour, each  _ bard _ plays their piece.

The witcher hates it.

He has his hood raised, black against the sunny day, as he pushes through the crowds. His swords tucked beneath his heavy cloak, his golden eyes peering from the shadows that hide his face, luminous in the dark. People jump out of his way as they become aware of his hulking form, taller than most of the market-goers, men and women alike. They avoid touching him, creating a path for him in the direction he has chosen.

The hairs on the back of his neck raise and his skin prickles as he glances around furtively. No one is watching him, not any more than usual. He bares his teeth at a young girl with curious blue eyes and she squeaks and hides behind her mother. The day is warm but the witcher is cold, drawing his cloak tighter. 

The wind whispers through trees that line the street. An echo, a cry, a plea. Voices fill the breeze but the witcher can’t hear them, can’t tell them apart. They beg for his attention, and he must ignore them as he continues on his way. Their frigid hands clutch at his arms, grab at his hair, scratch his skin and his armor tears. 

But he doesn’t look back.

He keeps walking, the sunny day bleak and the clear sky empty. The warm temperature doesn’t touch him as he’s turned to stone and ice. His heart is hardened, cracked and bleeding as it aches for the heat of companionship, but he ignores it and continues on his way. His fingers grip the edges of his cloak, the rough fabric grounding him against the threat of floating away.

His head is in the clouds, thoughts muzzy and thin as they slip away from his grasp. As his boots thud against the stone with the weight of his steps, he hears it as though through a torn veil. The ends of it wispy and unraveling with each swell of thought that presses against the delicate weave, a marriage of convenience between himself and the world. He is a bride doomed to a groom of misery. It doesn’t matter, he can’t make sense of it, those kinds of words don’t belong to him.

He stumbles on, turning down an alley as the frozen hands push and prod at him, clutching his throat and stealing his every breath. His eyes burn from not blinking, but if he blinks he might see them. All he can do is let them lead. His skin is tight, splitting over his bones in invisible cracks as he’s flayed from his body. His mind is broken and heart is shattered and he does nothing but follow for he has no use. He has no purpose. He has no one and nothing and isn’t that exactly what he wanted?

The ghosts of Oxenfurt send him east.


	3. The Woods

There’s a whip-poor-will whistling somewhere amidst the bleeding trees.

The witcher stands alone. His hands are soaked with ichor as dark as his eyes, his sword oiled with the pitch. It drips upon the detritus that crunches underfoot, deadened plants and minuscule remains snapping and turning to dust beneath his shifting weight. Ants crawl beneath his skin, shaking his bones and shivering the sinewy thread that holds him together. He vibrates on the spot, shuddering with a burning need.

He needs to hunt. To kill. To twist living flesh betwixt his bare hands and rent it in twain. 

His prey is already deceased. 

The beast lays before him, collapsing like a crumbling tower in a stiff breeze. Its limbs are spread akimbo as its blood soaks into the earth, staining the soil as dark as the night sky above. The stars are barely visible, dense clouds passing overhead and giving the grinning moon a veil to shine through. The wind that tenderly caresses the copper leaves sends some cascading through the air, fluttering delicately to join their brethren in death upon the forest floor.

A single golden leaf is carried upon the swells of the breeze towards the witcher. Silver flashes and the veins are split, two halves dropping at his feet. The shining voids of his eyes, framed by inflamed skin and blackened veins, lower to the ground.

He snarls suddenly and spins on his heel, leaving behind the corpse to stalk through the trees. The witcher’s neck twitches, chin tilting, angling his head to listen for something. His scowl deepens as the woods remain vacant of the sound he desires. The distant huff of a horse echoes towards him and he redirects his path, coming upon an empty camp.

His fire is still crackling merrily, sparks drifting into the canopy and flames reaching heavenward to dance among the stars. His steed is grazing nearby, a small patch of soft grass providing the mare with delectable morsels. He walks to a log that he turned over hours earlier and sits down heavily, eyes fading to gold once more. Slowly, oh so slowly, he begins to unbuckle and remove his worn armor.

The leather is thinning and cracked along the buckles, the seams ripping apart. Indents in the pauldrons are all that remains of long gone rivets and studs, and the dye has faded to a mottled gray. He pauses, glancing up and around the camp.

His bags are set neatly beside the tack of his horse, the saddle and bridle and girth rubbed down with oil to keep it loose and clean. A closed lute case rests against one of the packs, the strap wrapped around a metal hook. Two bedrolls are laid out upon the cleared earth, untouched.

One set of footprints and a broken sob is all that fills the woods.


	4. Kaer Morhen

High-vaulted ceilings painted with flaking and faded portraits are all that remain of the beauty of Kaer Morhen. Crumbling stone showers the floor with dust and cracking mortar. A frozen wind wriggles and writhes through the gaps, gripping the masonry and forcing itself into the warmed halls of the keep in an icy draft that skirts along the baseboard and cools the floor.

The witcher sits before a roaring hearth, the heat of the inferno warming his skin and curling the ends of his damp hair. His brothers laugh uproariously around him, jeering and jesting amongst one another, leaving the witcher to sit sullenly. He stares into the tankard of lukewarm ale that he holds, fingers made for slaughter wrapped around it.

The chair he’s perched on is stiff and hard, his elbows digging into his knees and his hair falling in a wall around his face. His brothers glance at him, concern written into their eyes but their lips remain pulled into garish smiles of faked mirth as they attempt to coax the witcher into their merriment. A bottle of grain alcohol stands on the table, and one of his brothers picks it up and waves it around before setting it back down, still sealed.

The keep has felt empty, barren and bereft, for decades. But it’s never been as lonely for the witcher as it is now.

“Cheer up, Geralt!” one of his brothers says as he plops down beside the witcher, “Now you can go farther and faster than you ever could before! He was just--” the other brother smacks him upside the head.

“Shut the fuck up, Lambert, there’s a time and a place.”

The witcher just hums absently, barely paying either of his brothers any mind as he continues to watch the ale. It ripples and flows with each tremor that racks his shoulders, each shudder that rolls down his spine. He tilts the tankard to watch it slide up the side, nearly tipping over the lip but held in a bulging wave by its own surface tension. The ale is as bland as he is.

It requires spice, maybe some carbonation, something to make it more exciting than it is in its current state. As it is, it's flat; only as cool as the temperature of his skin that warms the wooden tankard. It’s a burden to have and to hold but he can’t let it go.

The voices of his brothers fades away as the witcher drifts from his body, his mind separate and floating listlessly through the keep. He passes through a wall, out into the howling blizzard and roiling snow but it doesn’t affect him. He’s cold. 

He’s always cold. His blood slogging through his veins and pumped by his slow-beating heart. His skin is hot to the touch, as it always is, but he himself is plagued by shivers. As though his body is nothing more than a walking corpse, piloted by a mind as empty of joy as the world is. He can’t remember how long it’s been since he’s been warm.


	5. Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Graphic Animal Death

Breathing comes hot and heavy as it burns the witcher’s throat, ripping his voice away with each ragged exhale. His boots thunder across the wooden floor, steps muffled to rapid thumps by the crimson carpet runner. Heat licks at his heels, a firestorm feline winding around his ankles. 

Sweat drips down his temple, drawing a line in the soot that blackens his pale skin. Somewhere in the manor, a woman screams in agony as her heavy skirts are alight with the inferno that consumes the grandeur. Flames climb the walls, devouring the tapestries and curdling the wallpaper. It cracks and curls from the heat, the glue melting away instantly, creating further tinder for the ravenous blaze.

The witcher hurtles around a corner, swords banging wildly against his back and giving his gasping breaths a rhythmic stutter. His eyes are red, watering from the thick smoke that pollutes the air. He chokes on his next inhale, coughing heavily and hacking wetly. The toe of his boot catches on a fold in the carpet and the witcher falls forward, knees skidding and palms burning. He wheezes and lets his head drop, trying desperately to clear his lungs below the building density of black smoke.

A dog whines in the room to his right. Claws scratch frantically at the wooden door, rasping against the woodgrain. The witcher gets to his feet again, pulling the collar of his sweat-damp shirt up and over his nose and mouth. He grabs the doorknob and shouts, yanking away. An imprint of the noble’s crest is burned into his palm.

The dog cries again, digging at the base of the door with increasing intensity before rasping a thin bark. Smoke curls in thin wisps out from beneath the door. The witcher can’t smell anything over the acrid scent of ash that settles over everything and stains his smarting nose. He takes a few quick breaths and steels himself, reaching for the knob.

The door explodes outwards.

He’s thrown back against the opposite wall of the hall, head slamming against the fractured wallpaper and splintering the wood. His head spins, eyes unfocused, and he slowly lists to the side for a few moments to catch his bearings. He gradually becomes aware of something hot and smoldering beneath his cheek, fur tickling his nose and bringing with it the scents of charred meat and--

The witcher sits up abruptly, eyes widening in horror at the burned corpse beside him. The dog was thrown from the room, just the same as he, but it took the brunt of the blast. He feels the creeping tendrils of panic constricting around him as his lungs hiccup and a scream claws at his tender throat. The manor groans audibly and a wooden beam above him cracks. 

The witcher wraps an arm around the dog and throws himself to the side, bringing the creature with him as the beam snaps and collapses through the floor, dragging the carpet runner along with it. The red fabric turns black as it burns, the golden accents licked by flames.

He hauls himself to his feet, hoisting the dog over one shoulder, and sprinting down the hall once more. The house is crumbling around him, succumbing to the voracious inferno. His time is running short.

He finds the stairs that lead to the ground floor, only for them to have been destroyed by the collapsing roof. Each breath whines in his chest, his lungs tight and stinging and protesting each ragged inhale. There’s no other way down, not unless he wants to risk jumping out of a window.

The witcher glances behind him. The fire is gaining with a speed paralleled only by the meanest of nekkers. If he doesn’t act, he’ll be engulfed as well. 

He backs up a few steps, ensures that the dead dog is secure on his shoulder, sprints forward, and _jumps._

He hits the floor hard, his knee buckling beneath his weight as he falls to the ground. The witcher ducks into a roll over his shoulder, only to hear the sickening crunching of bones and the squelch of contorted flesh directly in his ear, wet heat spraying across his neck. The witcher disregards it, leaping to his feet once more and dashing from the manor.

Once he’s a good distance away, it’s with shaking hands that he removes his canine accessory. The dog’s chestnut fur is matted and singed, blackened with soot and stained with blood. The worst is the way its skull has been flattened, blue eyes bulging, one squashed like a grape betwixt two fingers, and the witcher carefully lays it on the ground before turning away and heaving. He did this. 

He couldn’t even save a _dog._ How could he have saved--no. No, that’s not what happened and he knows it. He knows what happened, he lived it, he _caused_ it. There’s no empty promises and pretty words of comfort for him. Not anymore.


	6. Found

His stomach cramps and claws at his throat, tongue like sandpaper and lips cracked and bleeding. His eyes burn but still he refuses to sleep. The witcher is starving, but not for lack of game. He’s dehydrated, but not from the absence of water. His soul has left him. His very essence, his reason for  _ being, _ gone without a trace.

How long he’s been laying in the road, he’s not sure. The sky spins above him, clear and calm as shadows writhe amidst the wisps of clouds. They dance together, white and black, a waltz that teases him. Taunts him. With things that have been, things that are, and things that could be. They twist into shapes, familiar shapes: that’s a medallion, that’s the pommel of a sword, that’s a bottle of oil, that’s the neck of a lute.

His eyes are heavy and his head is floating free, flying, soaring, reaching for the sky. He so desperately wants to join in the reverie of the demons and the clouds. He doesn’t want to be alone anymore.

His breath stutters in his chest and, inches away from salvation, he’s suddenly plummeting. Dropping rapidly, tumbling and twisting and falling back to the earth; back into a body that doesn’t want him. Hands are grabbing at his shoulders, pulling at his face, and he smiles at the blue eyes that look down at him in concern.

“You found me,” the witcher whispers. His eyes roll back and he’s gone.

When he wakes, it’s to the wooden ceiling of a cottage. A fire crackles in the low hearth nearby, a pot of something delicious bubbling over the flames. A rocking chair is perched in the corner, woven blanket tossed over the back, and his packs are neatly stacked beside it. The lute case is open.

The lute is gone.

Panic surges through him as he sits up too quickly. The cottage pitches around him, rolling like a ship atop a stormy sea, and he gags before turning and retching into a bucket placed beside his bed. Surprisingly, there’s something to be vomited at all, the soured flavors of meat left upon his tongue. The witcher sits back again, chest heaving as exhausted panting breaths force themselves between stinging lips.

Where is he? How did he get here? The last thing he remembers is-- blue eyes. 

For the second time, the witcher sits up, more gingerly to avoid another round of heaving. He takes a deep breath in through his nose and…  _ there. _ The faint smells of oak and petrichor. His heart leaps to his throat, pounding at his larynx and choking him from anything more than shallow breaths. 

This shouldn’t be possible. 

Footsteps approach the door and the witcher’s eyes are glued to it as he stops breathing entirely. On creaking hinges, rust cascading to the ground, the door swings open.

There’s a woman in the doorway.

The witcher’s shoulders slump and he drops his eyes as the woman walks in, holding the lute delicately.

“Where did you get this?” She demands, her accent achingly familiar to him. The clipped consonants and soft vowels, lilting words drop from her painted lips in a macabre melody. “Tell me, witcher.”

“My bard,” he murmurs, “It belonged to my bard.”

She glances down at the lute and then back up at the witcher before sighing, “I should have known. Destiny is most unkind to witchers and women.”

The witcher frowns and watches her put the lute back in its case, snapping the clasps shut again.

“I can feel your questions burning through the back of my skull,” she says in amusement, “Worry not, I didn’t harm my brother’s lute.”


	7. Snow

“Your brother?” the witcher asks, almost faintly. His head spins and he feels like he’s losing his grasp on reality, “he never said--”

“That he had a sorceress for a sister?” 

“No, but--”

The sorceress shakes her head in exasperation, “Typical. To be fair to him, we had a falling out some time ago.”

The witcher’s brow furrows, “A falling out?”

She nods, retrieving a wooden bowl from a cabinet and going to the pot in the hearth, “Mm. We disagreed on something crucial oh… maybe two decades ago now.”

The witcher shouldn’t ask, normally wouldn’t. Ordinarily, he couldn't care less about the squabbles that snare the hearts and minds of siblings. But this time is different. “Can I ask… can I ask what about?”

“Think, witcher,” she smiles wryly, “What could Jaskier the Bard possibly have been doing twenty years ago that his darling sister wouldn’t approve of?”

The witcher racks his brains as the sorceress presses a bowl of soup into his hands. It smells delightful, rich and heady with the stock of chickens and sharp with cracked pepper. It warms his hands and he pulls the bowl closer, sipping from it as his ravenous hunger makes itself known. He can’t remember what his bard might have been doing two decades prior to today, and gives the sorceress a small, helpless shrug.

She scoffs as she settles down in her rocking chair, picking up wound wool and two long needles, “My brother was traveling with a witcher. The Butcher of Blaviken to boot. You can imagine the concern I had for him.”

The witcher’s stomach twists at the old moniker, threatening the reappearance of the soup he just devoured. 

He clenches his jaw and takes a slow breath in through his nose, heart lurching at the strength of the scent shared by his bard and the sorceress. “It was his decision.”

“Of course it was. But my brother wasn’t known for his wisdom, now, was he?”

The witcher finishes the food and sets the bowl on the bed by his knee, keeping his eyes averted. He can’t stand to look at such a familiar blue in an unfamiliar face, not after what he did. He runs his fingers over the blanket that covers him from the waist down, the wool fibers softened from time and water, the gentle scent of peonies wafting up to his nose. It’s a lovely mid-tone gray, warm against the brown of the floor and the tan of the straw mattress he sits upon.

“I don’t know what to say,” the witcher admits after some time. The sorceress looks up from her knitting and then glances out the window at the snow falling gently outside. Winter has come, with bitter winds and biting chills that frosts window panes and decorates eaves with dripping icicles.

“You can stay a while, rest up,” a small, sad smile dances on her lips, “and tell me all about my baby brother.”


	8. Chamomile

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Panic Attack

The sorceress has been traveling with the witcher for almost two months. She’s patched him up after hunts, ensured he got paid fairly, and made him smile more than he has in two years. It leaves him with a heavy feeling in his stomach, a weight pulling down that tightens his lungs and narrows his throat and drowns him in an ocean of guilt. It isn’t until he’s aching with the aftermath of toxicity that it all comes to a head.

He’s strained something, he knows it, but for the life of the witcher he can’t figure out what exactly it is. Part of that is the haziness of his thoughts, remnants of the three potions he consumed to dance with the devil while waltzing with a warg, and part is the general feeling of disjointment that’s plagued him ever since the Incident. He’s laying face down on the bed when he smells the heady, herbal scents of oil, making his shoulders relax and his mind calm.

He hears the quiet sounds of the oil being rubbed between palms to warm it, his fuzzy thoughts wandering to blue eyes and the constant chatter of a bard. The bard must be choosing to be quiet today, he usually does when Geralt is coming down from the vice of the toxins he swallows. The soft footsteps of sock-clad feet approach, and the bed dips as the bard kneels on it and straddles his hips. It feels a bit off, like there isn’t quite enough weight, but perhaps the bard has slimmed down over the winter.

When slim, delicate hands press into his shoulders, soft and free of the calluses of lute strings, the illusion is shattered.

The witcher jerks, jumping to his feet and knocking the sorceress off of him. He’s heedless of his nudity as he grabs the bottle of oil, so tantalizingly scented, so many memories tied to it, and hurls it into the blazing fire.

“What the hell was that about?” the sorceress demands of his scars. 

The vial had shattered with the crash of his tears, contents hissing in time with his wheezing breath. The room swims and the ground tilts and the witcher finds himself on his knees, hunched over with fists to his face. Each aborted breath hitching with a keen, sobs leaning on the hiccuping barks that rip free of his chest.

A hand lights upon his shoulder and he wrenches himself away, pain shooting up his spine with the contortion but the touch is  _ too much, _ too much. With no regard for his self image, not anymore, the witcher  _ wails. _ His pain manifesting in an inhuman plea for a relief that never comes; a sound that ricochets off the walls of the room, amplifying its volume and the agony within each decibel. 

The sorceress stands beside the man, unsure of what to do, what she can do, but watch; hands hovering uselessly as his sorrows flood the room and drip between the floorboards.


	9. Destiny

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Hallucinations

The witcher sits and listens to the popping of his fire, the way the wood splits and cracks with the heat that builds within each pocket of air that’s trapped within the sturdy oak grain. His gaze is far away, knees pulled up as he leans against the saddle of his horse that grazes nearby and his arms looped loosely around them. While his face is turned to the contained blaze, he doesn’t see it.

He watches as a man who isn’t there approaches, holding out a strong hand. The witcher takes it, pulled to his feet and eyes rolling in good-natured mirth. He remains seated on the ground as the bard’s gaudy silks catch the orange glow of the flickering flames, ruffles casting dancing shadows across the doublet, folds darkening the trousers, eyes hidden by the fringe that shades his brow. The wind howls but the witcher doesn’t hear it, damp cheeks shining as he prays for the vision to be real.

He remembers the feel of the bard’s cool hand in his own warm one, fingers wrapped around scars and laced through his. A weight upon his shoulder as they slowly swayed to the whispered words of a ballad that dripped from pink lips onto the skin of his neck. The witcher closes his eyes, bowing his head and inhaling to try and catch the scent of petrichor, the musk of oak; smells that used to cling to him like a second skin but are no more. He doesn’t want to look up again, doesn’t want to watch as the visage of himself gets to do what he can no longer: the slide of lips, the warmth of loving and being loved in return.

“Geralt?”

The witcher lifts his head, eyes bloodshot and face stained with tears. The wind has died down and before him stands his Child Surprise. She crouches down, resting a hand upon his knee and wears a concerned expression as her green eyes meet his own. Her face falls and her other hand comes up to caress his cheek, comforting in a way only the touch of his daughter can be.

“It wasn’t your fault,” she whispers, moving to sit beside him and wrap an arm around his shoulders, “You couldn’t have known.”

“I should have known,” his voice comes out as a rough croak. He doesn’t bother clearing his throat. “I should have seen something like that as a possibility. And now he’s gone.” He looks down at his hands, crimson staining the creases of his skin until he blinks. The witcher grabs his gloves and pulls them back on again, relishing in the creak of leather that conceals his fingers.

“How could you?” His daughter asks him, “How could you have guessed something like that would happen?”

“I…”

“You couldn’t have,” she says firmly, squeezing his shoulder beneath her hand, “It isn’t your fault, Geralt.”

He’s heard it so many times before, and will hear it again, but he can’t accept it. The witcher averts his eyes, looking to the side where his sword is piercing the ground. “Perhaps you’re right,” he murmurs.

“Of course I’m right,” she says with a small teasing smile, one he doesn’t see. His eyes are fixed on the blade. “Geralt?”

The bard lays beneath it, beautiful silks painted with blood.


	10. Teeth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Body Horror

The witcher always thought that his bard had beautiful teeth.

Snow-like in their whiteness, as straight as the edge of a blade; he was certain magic had been used at some point to correct any imperfections in alignment or color. The bard was fastidious in the cleaning of his teeth, never skipping that step in his daily rituals but oft complaining about it. How time consuming it was and how much money he had to spend on paste and a brush. How he hated the flavor and the feeling. 

_ “Geralt, you’re so lucky this is something your wither-y mutations have made moot.” _

The witcher never informs him it’s because his saliva is acidic enough to clean his teeth for him. How the enamel is diamond-like in its armor; how his gums are thicker, his cheeks tougher, his lips more leathery to avoid damage via his spit or his fangs. The bard never got to discover it either.

The witcher rolls the contents of his closed fist around and around and around as he rides his horse through the empty countryside. There isn’t a town for miles, the sky clear and vast and lacking in anything to break up the endless blue. The last time a living creature was on this road was hours before, and it will be hours again until the witcher comes across anything other than himself. 

Around and around and around.

They rattle in his palm, clinking together in the cup of his hand. His fingers are curled, his skin bare, and sharp edges poke into his creases. Thirty of them.

The bard, he learned, was missing two teeth. They had cracked when he was once kicked in the jaw by a fellow troubadour at Oxenfurt for sleeping with the woman’s fiancee. The bard stood by that it wasn’t his fault, he did no wrong for the fiancee had failed to inform him she was engaged to be wed. And besides, were the fiancee happily engaged, she wouldn’t have sought out new company than her betrothed. 

But the damage had been done and the teeth were cracked by the toe of a heeled boot and the dentist he visited had removed them. Two molars, on the same side, one on top and one on the bottom. Just, pop! Right out of his mouth and the pain was relieved. The witcher had found the story amusing, and so very like the bard, that he asked to see the holes where the teeth once resided. 

Without hesitation, the bard had opened his mouth and pointed them out with his dexterous tongue and the witcher had found himself staring for far longer than was proper.

Around and around and around.

Thirty teeth rattle in his palm.


	11. Hands

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Hallucinations, Panic Attack, Sensory Overload, Suicidal Ideation

His daughter begins to travel with him, filling the space of the sorceress who filled the space of a bard. She says it’s just because she’s got nothing better to do, because she needs the coin, because she likes his company; he knows they’re all lies. 

The witcher knows that it’s because he sits quietly and doesn’t make a sound, that the number of syllables he utters is next to naught. He knows it’s because he’ll look at nothing at all, gazing into the distance as the fire dwindles and dies until he’s left sitting in darkness. He knows it’s because of the way his hands are stained.

She’s watching him.

~~ A bard follows him. ~~

His daughter walks beside him. Walks behind him. Walks ahead of him.

He feels loose marbles rattling around his skull.

Everything is steadily becoming too much. The world too loud. He can hear the buzzing of a bee’s wings five miles away, the rapid hum of the heart of a hare in the brush. Every whisper of wind against the leaves, every rasping inhale of his horse, every clink and clank and thump and thud and every _ little  _ **_thing._ **

It’s the creaking of his gloves that pushes him past his breaking point. 

Without signaling to his steed, the witcher throws himself from the saddle and lands hard on his back. The air is knocked from his aching lungs and he wheezes the dust while the horses whinny and whine. His daughter leaps down beside him, calming his horse as he yanks the gloves off and hurls them away from him. It’s too much, too  _ much, too much! _

The blood staining his hands is revealed. The witcher curls his fingers into fists as he staggers to his feet, clutching bloodied hands to his chest. A high-pitched keen fills the air and his face is curtained by silver locks that brush his cheeks and are  _ too much. _

“Geralt!” His daughter is crying, her voice filled with tears. Her hands grab his as he wrenches a dagger from his belt.

The witcher jerks away, slashing out wildly. He hears his daughter cry out, as though through a fog, the sound echoing around his hazy mind as he focuses on  _ too much, too much. _

The hair falls to the ground, painted red by his crimson hands.

“Geralt!”

Still, he doesn’t reply. She has a hand to her face, only one green eye visible. Her cheek is red. His hands stain further. He can’t breathe.

He chokes on the words, an apology threatens to suffocate him. It gurgles and burns in his throat and he coughs. Iron touches his tongue. He turns away, emptying the contents of his stomach onto the ground. They’re red. He blinks. It’s bile. When did he last eat?

Who cares.

He doesn’t care anymore. He wants it to stop, it all to end, to be over. Finite. Fin! He looks at his hands. His skin is bloody.

“Axii.”


	12. Baths

The witcher awakens in a bath. The water is hot, almost scalding, against his skin. Hands are buried in his hair, so like how things used to be that he’s almost fooled. He could let himself be tricked again, allow himself the illusion like he did with the sorceress. 

There’s no scent of chamomile in the air this time. No petrichor. No oak. 

Instead there’s the smell of iron. Of copper and alchemy and ozone. Of goats.

“Eskel?” The witcher murmurs, his eyes still closed against the world.

“In the flesh,” his brother chuckles softly, thick fingers massaging through shorn locks. “You’ve really done a number on yourself this time, Geralt.”

“I… couldn’t help it.”

“I know.”

A terrible thought occurs to the witcher, “Am I going to end up like Aiden?”

His brother is quiet for a long few moments, hands stilling briefly in their ministrations, “I’m not sure.”

The witcher thinks about his Cat cousin. How he has to be monitored by the witcher’s other brother. Constantly accompanied for fear of the Cat tearing himself apart at the seams that fray further with each day. Falling apart against his will, his mind flaying itself as it fights the very same mutations that keep it alive.

“I hope not,” his brother finishes. The witcher secretly wishes the same.

“How did you get here?”

“Ciri summoned me. Opened a portal to where I was and had me use Axii on you. You were behaving erratically.”

The witcher swallows thickly. He has vague memories of the overwhelming sound of the world, of crimson staining his hands. Of the sawing of a blade at his hair. He cautiously lifts his hands above the water, shoulders slumping in relief as he sees pale skin and pink scars but no signs of the blood that he couldn’t remove, that he concealed with leather and pretended wasn’t there.

“The blood…”

“There was no blood,” his brother says quietly, “Geralt… maybe we should have Yennefer--”

“ _ No.” _

“But maybe it would help!”

“I won’t forget him, Eskel,” the witcher snarls, “I won’t let her remove my memory.”

“Not  _ remove _ it, Geralt,” his brother pleads, “just alter it. I know, I hate the idea of someone rummaging around in my head and changing my memories--”

“Then why ask it of me?”

“--but look at yourself! You’re unraveling! You’re falling apart and you won’t let any of us help, all because of an accident!”

“IT WASN’T AN ACCIDENT!”

The witcher’s voice is powerful in the bathing chambers, rough with age and emotion. Silence follows.

Finally, his brother speaks once more; in a small voice he asks, “What?”

The witcher sighs and wipes away the burn in his eyes as he croaks, “It wasn’t an accident.”

“How wasn’t it… you were under a  _ spell _ \--”

The witcher interrupts him.

“I want to see Yennefer.”


	13. Portals

It was with reluctance that his brother left the witcher to finish bathing in silence. The water sloshing against the sides of the tub, the gentle scrubbing of the sponge, all of it soothing the fraying ends of his mind. He remains submerged until the bath has gone cold, his skin wrinkled and pruned and as dry as a desert; but clean. Gone are the traces of blood, the evidence of wrongdoing, the reminders of his failures.

He’s dressed in a simple shirt and trousers, seated on the bed, when the purple-eyed mage arrives. She sweeps into the room, grandiose drama oozing from every pore, grandeur in each step and sweep of her long skirts. Clad in black, as she always is, the gown she wears frames her chest and small waist, flaring at the hips. Her raven locks are tied up in a bow, baring her long neck and slim shoulders. She’s beautiful. She’s fatal.

They’ve tried before. Over and over again have they tried. And together, after a mountain, it was decided that they wouldn’t try anymore. Defined by the shape of their edges, their puzzle pieces didn’t fit together no matter how hard they forced. 

“Geralt,” the mage crosses her arms, standing before him. “Quite the new look. It suits you.”

“It was one he did on a whim,” his brother says as he re-enters the room. The witcher hasn’t seen his daughter again.

“Where’s Ciri?” 

His brother’s golden eyes flicker towards the door, “Downstairs. She fears she was part of the problem.”

The mage raises her eyebrows, arching them in curiosity, “What happened?”

They both look towards the witcher, but when he fails to answer his brother speaks instead, “Geralt had… a lapse in judgement.”

“A breakdown.”

“I wouldn’t call it that--”

“It’s not untrue, Eskel,” the witcher murmurs, “Let her call it what it is.”

The mage unfolds her arms, placing her thin fingers on her hips, “Why was I summoned?”

“Geralt?” His brother looks to him.

The witcher inhales deeply, “You offered once to change my memory of the events. Of what happened.”

“With that bard?”

“Mhm.”

“I suppose I still can,” she muses, “it’ll be more difficult now, the memories are older and more set in stone. Especially if they’re ones you revisit frequently.”

“I wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t important.”

The mage steps forward, capturing the witcher’s chin in her firm grip, “It might be easiest to forget him entirely.”

The witcher looks into her violet eyes. Despite the appearance of nonchalance that she exudes, the expression of disinterest upon her face, her eyes are sharp and concerned. She doesn’t want him to make this decision, to ask this of her, but she won’t stop him from doing what he must to move on. 

But does he want to move on?

“I’d like to still remember something of him,” the witcher says quietly, “And if it isn’t too much to ask, might we be able to do this at Kaer Morhen?”

“A familiar place? Not a bad idea. It’ll put your mind more at ease,” the mage nods and releases his jaw, “Less difficulty in changing one's mind when it isn’t on the defensive.”

“I’ll go get Ciri,” his brother says and sidles out of the room. 

The witcher sighs, “No chance we can just travel to Kaer Morhen, is there?”

“I don’t care for the dirt and drivel of the road, Geralt, you know this,” the mage sniffs and outstretches her hand, a portal forming on the wall.

“I thought as much.”

“Come along now, we haven’t all day. Ciri can portal herself and Eskel along after us.”

The witcher gets to his feet and shoulders his pack, tucking his bundled armor under his arm. He takes a deep breath, steeling himself against the nausea that’s about to plague him, and steps through the portal.


	14. Eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Nightmares

The keep is quiet and empty when they arrive, footsteps echoing through the stone halls. The ghosts of witchers whisper in their ears, a sound they’re more than capable of ignoring after decades of adaptation. The witcher feels cold against his cheek, turning his face away from the hand that isn’t there and stalking forward. 

The mage follows at a distance before disappearing up the steps that lead to the top of the western tower, the one she occupies most frequently. His daughter and brother arrive moments after him, his daughter scurrying up the same steps and his brother catching up to him.

“Any idea where Vesemir is?” the witcher asks gruffly.

His brother shrugs, “I’d assume in town. It’s the middle of summer, Geralt, I haven’t been here either.” They fall into an uneasy silence as his brother walks with him towards the sleeping quarters. “We missed you. Over winter. Even Lambert wouldn’t shut up about it.”

“He was probably just complaining about not having an extra person there to do repairs,” he grumbles.

“Maybe a bit. But he was complaining mostly about you not being here to drink with him.”

“Sure sounds like he was concerned.”

“It’s how he shows he’s worried, Geralt, you know that.”

The witcher sighs with a nod, “You’re right, I’m sorry. How is he anyway?”

“Stressed. The entire winter he kept using the xenovox to contact Keira Metz.”

“I thought he had a thing going with Aiden?”

His brother hums in affirmation, “He does. Aiden was staying with Metz. Lambert says it was just because Aiden wasn’t comfortable being here, but I think the cat’s slipping.”

The witcher frowns, stopping in front of his bedroom door, “Again? Didn’t he just have a slip last year?”

“That’s what I thought too. Apparently it never stopped,” his brother says gravely, “Lambert was barely on the Path, watching over him.”

The witcher rumbles a wordless noise of unease before opening his door, “Call me when dinner’s ready. I’m going to rest.”

“You look like you need it.”

“Fuck off.”

The witcher closes the door and drops his things on the ground before falling forward into bed, not even bothering to remove his boots. He closes his eyes.

He sees blue.

A warm hand slips into his own, a head nestled under his chin. The scent of oak and petrichor filling his nose as his legs tangle with long, strong thighs. Jaskier smiles up at him, reaching a delicate hand up to brush back the long white hair that covers Geralt’s face. He leans into Jaskier’s touch, pressing his face further against callused fingertips and roughened palms. Geralt turns his head to press his lips against the scar that runs through the meat of Jaskier’s hand, a stupid mistake leading to a blade slicing him, he said. 

Jaskier turns them so that Geralt is on his back, hips straddled and eyes filled with blue, blue, blue. That vibrant cerulean looking at him so intensely, like looking into the sun, that Geralt needs to close his own eyes against it. Something wet drips on his face.

Geralt opens his eyes again. Tears are dripping down Jaskier’s nose, spilling out of those blue eyes with wild abandon. Warmth trickles up his arm. His hand is wrapped around the hilt of his sword, the blade pushed through Jaskier’s chest. 

He can see the sword through Jaskier’s back.

“Why would you do this to me?” Jaskier whispers, “I thought you loved me.”

The witcher wakes up screaming.


	15. Father

The witcher didn’t sleep again that night. Instead, after dinner, he sat in the great hall in front of the fireplace, a lukewarm tankard of ale in his hand that he doesn’t take a sip from. It’s so familiar: this place, this situation, even the way he’s sitting. Yet it’s wrong.

The air is too warm, each breath filled with a humidity that shouldn’t be in the halls of the keep. The stone grows lichen that’s blasted off periodically with Igni, leaving scorch marks on the walls. Something drips somewhere in the lower floors, most probably the cellar, from condensation building and coalescing in the warm summer weather. He can hear crickets chirping through the glass-less windows, a crisp breeze carrying with it the scents of dry grasses and blossoming trees.

The witcher sighs, thinking about the decision he’s made. Is it the right one? Is forgetting the bard the way to go? Would it even fix him? This could all be side effects of the mutagens breaking down, tearing him apart from the inside out. It’s uncommon, but not unheard of, for the alchemy to suddenly fight back with age. To destroy the host after decades of existing peacefully. 

His hand is shaking, the ale trembling against the sides of the cup.

“I thought I’d find you here.”

The witcher looks up at the voice that enters the hall, rough with centuries of words. His father walks over, for once not wearing his armor, and sits down beside the witcher. He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees and clasping his hands together in front of him.

They sit in amicable silence for an undetermined amount of time before the witcher breaks it, “Am I doing the right thing?”

His father takes a deep, slow breath. He groans as he exhales and sits up again, resting his hands upon his thighs, “Does it feel like you are?”

“That’s not what I asked, Vesemir.”

“No, but it’s the important question.”

The witcher looks down at his hands. At the tankard of ale that’s stained with crimson. The blood has slowly returned since his bath, since parting with his brother who had to return to the Path. He sets the tankard aside and grips his fingers tightly to stop their trembling.

“I don’t know.”

His father looks over at him for a moment before back at the fire. There’s no reason to preserve their night vision, not here. “Let me ask you this, Geralt. If it were you, would you want him to forget you?”

“Yes. Of course. I wouldn’t want him to live with even a day of pain.”

“That would be impossible. There is no life without pain and torment. But the hardships we endure make the good in our lives that much better.” His father turns to face him, “Now, answer me again. Would you want Jaskier to forget you? All of you? The good and the bad?”

The witcher is quiet as he thinks. Would he? Of course he’d want the bard to forget the fear of running from monsters when he foolishly got too close. The startle he suffered each time the witcher returned with toxicity running through his veins and whitening his face. The pain of each scar he suffered at the witcher’s side.

But… but the witcher doesn’t think he’d want the bard to forget each time they stopped in a meadow for a break far too early in the day, solely because the weather was beautiful and flowers were blooming. Each time they tousled and rolled across the ground with grins on their faces and laughter in the air. Each gentle touch, each tender look, each peal of mirth that escaped their lips together.

He wouldn’t want the bard to forget him.

“What do I do?” The witcher whispers, his face tortured and his voice choked.

“Well, I don’t think you can bring him back,” his father chuckles softly, wrapping an arm around the witcher’s shoulders, “but you can start by accepting that he’s gone.”

“But  _ how, _ Vesemir? He was such a-- an integral part of me. I don’t think I can do that.”

“He isn’t coming back,” his father says gently, “I’m sorry.”

The witcher sits silently, staring at his blood stained hands. Eventually, he whispers, “but I can… he  _ could _ come back.”

“Geralt--”

“It’s not unheard of. I could bring him back.”

“It’s not a good idea, Geralt.”

The witcher nods his head once in acquiescence, even as his mind races. It’ll be difficult, but nothing in his life is ever easy or simple. And his reward would be the greatest of all:

He’d get his bard back.


	16. Gallop

The thundering hooves of his steed are the only sound accompanying the cacophonous downpour around him. Rain drips from the witcher’s nose, runs down his arms, soaks his cloak and washes away the sweat and lather that builds on his steed’s flank. The mare’s lungs work like bellows, each heavy breath huffed through flared nostrils and her teeth gnaw at the bit. 

Not long after coming to his realization, the witcher left Kaer Morhen without a word. He didn’t want anyone attempting to dissuade him from his objective. He knows this is foolhardy. That this idea is idiotic and farfetched and _dangerous._ But he doesn’t care. He’d give anything to see his bard again. 

So he had left, slipped away in the night as everyone slept. Tacked up his horse and went down the mountain. He found the first mage he could, phrasing his queries like curiosities. But by the keen look in the sorcerer’s green eyes, the witcher could guess that he wasn’t fooling anyone. But the sorcerer, reluctantly, gave him directions to a magic-user who might be willing to dabble in the darkest corners of chaos… for a price.

The witcher had made his way to the other mage, a hedge witch in the middle of nowhere. They sat and listened to his tale of woe, silent in their studious attention. Finally, they had nodded and said they could help, but they needed some ingredients first.

To begin, they required the head of a deathcap, plucked beneath a new moon on Midsummer’s Eve. The witcher is lucky that this year’s Midsummer takes place during that phase of the lunar cycle, the sky empty and the road dark ahead of him. Not a single light able to pierce the heavy clouds that dump buckets of precipitation onto him. His time wanes, however, as deathcaps can only be found in the depths of deciduous forests. 

The trees fly by him, bark slicked by water and gnarled trunks peering at him with eyes that exist only in his nightmares. His own keen eyes watch the ground, searching for the fungus that he so desperately needs. It will glow, a faint red bioluminescence in the dark underbrush, as it flourishes in the damp and the dank underbelly of rot. Its head will be black with the blood that engorges it, standing straight up out the eye sockets of white skulls or threading between ribs. The long stalks are pale and creamy, almost tempting enough to eat, but even a single bite of the deathcaps will have you becoming a host as well.

Between the trees, the witcher spots blue eyes.

He’s nearly thrown from his horse in response to the sharp tug he gives to her reins. She whinnies in discontent and annoyance, drawing his attention away from the blue that pierces the night. When he looks back, it’s gone.

A fine mist rolls along the ground between the jagged roots of the trees, contained to the spot where the blue eyes had been. The witcher swallows thickly and guides his horse closer, before halting her and jumping down to investigate. There, in the fog, is the skull of a deer. 

The bone is picked clean of meat, brilliantly white, bleached by the acids that leech out of the mushrooms that grow. They sprout from cracks in the skull, out of the jaw in a macabre bouquet, their heads black and a very faint red glow cast upon the teeth. The witcher bends down, ensuring his hands are gloved, and picks up the host of the deathcaps.

One ingredient down.


	17. Throat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Body Horror

The witcher dreams frequently. It’s something that always surprises people when they learn of it. A witcher? A beast with no emotions, no thoughts in its mind except to kill, kill, kill… can dream? A bard had learned, and wasn’t shocked at all. In fact, he would stay by the witcher’s side, coaxing him from whatever terrorized him in the dark, drawing him into warm arms and a firm embrace to ground him.

The witcher misses it.

He tosses and turns upon his bedroll, laid on the floor of the hedge witch’s hut. His eyes are shut tight, his face screwed up in pain; each breath a battle for a fast and sharp wheeze that’s forced from his lungs as quickly as it came.

_ “You… need a nap!” _

_ “I just want peace!” _

_ “Geralt!” _

_ “Like putting salve on a tumor.” _

_ “You’ve brought me apple juice.” _

_ “ _ _ Oh, they’re  _ really _ alive.” _

Blood on pale skin. On a gray shirt. On a blue doublet with ridiculous sleeves. A swollen bulge of magic pressing at the vocal cords of one who requires them as their instrument, their livelihood. Crimson teeth and bloodied smiles and wheezing gasping breaths. Gurgles in lungs and the slow, painful death of drowning on land. 

The dream changes.

The blood is still there, still staining satin skin, but the bard stands in a field. He wears a crown of thorns and a robe of hemlock over the pale blue trousers and bloodied gray shirt. The wind gently blows the grasses, ruffles the shaggy chestnut hair overdue for a trim. The witcher approaches.

The bard’s eyes are closed, his chest rising and falling gently with each breath. His skin is sallow, pallor pale and lifeless. Dark shadows ring his eyes and his fingers are made of bone. There’s a sword through his chest, silver for monsters, and the bard’s eyes fly open.

They’re black with blood.

“Why would you do this to me?” He whimpers, fingers coming up to wrap around the hilt protruding from his chest. “All I ever did was love you. And that made me a monster?”

“ _ No, _ Jaskier,” the witcher staggers forward, cupping the bard’s face in his hands. The skin is cold with death. “No, no, you’re not a monster. You’re never a monster.”

“Then why, Geralt?” 

“It was an accident. I  _ swear it, _ Jask. I didn’t think it was, for the longest time, but I see now that it wasn’t my fault. You have to believe me.”

“You could have fought their magic,” the bard whispers, “But you didn’t. You liked it.”

The witcher shakes his head, “No, I promise,  _ I swear _ to you. I would never do this.”

“But you did,” the bard looks up at him, blood streaking his cheeks like tears, and gives him a crimson smile. “It’s okay. I know you never liked my singing much anyway.”

_ “Jaskier,” _ the witcher admonishes him in a strangled voice, “You think I would kill you because I didn’t like your singing?”

The bard shrugs, voice faded and far away as it echoes around an empty skull, like marbles rattling around, “I wouldn’t know. I don’t get to think about anything anymore.”


	18. Potion

He feels them burning through his veins, scorching his skin and boiling in his stomach. This used to be something he didn’t fear; first, for not caring if his life were to end. It would be a noble death, one given to the Path. Then, because of a bard. Because of the concern the bard would have, emanating off of him in heady waves that the witcher couldn’t get enough of. Because of the gentle touches and soft voice that chattered on and on and on until the fire left his body and color returned to his skin.

He fears it now.

He’s taken too many. A Cat then a Killer Whale then a Blizzard and then, when bleeding and panicky, he downed a Swallow. The beast is dead now, the monster he was contracted for lays before him with its chest flayed open and its heart stopped by his sword. But he doesn’t have any White Honey, nothing to negate the effects of the toxin searing his insides. 

His stomach roils, but if he vomits now he’ll burn up his esophagus. The deadly concoction in his stomach is poison and acid; only his mutations are saving him now. And they might not for much longer if his hunch is correct. 

The witcher sits down and lays back, gazing up at the stars as the stinking corpse of the monster lays beside him. It’s almost too bright, with the Cat affecting his sight as it is, the little pinpricks of light in the fabric of the night burning like candles against the navy sky. He takes a few deep breaths, letting them out slowly, attempting to drop into meditation as the toxins burn their way through him and eventually are metabolized.

The marbles threaten to rattle, but he keeps a firm grip on his sanity as he allows his mind to wander. 

A memory, so similar to the situation he’s in now, surfaces.

_ “Geralt, we ought to get you to a healer, don’t you think?” _

_ “They can’t help me.” _

_ “Well what can I do to help?” _

_ “Nothing, bard.” _

_ “I find that hard to believe. There’s always something someone can do to help their friends. You just need to stop being as stubborn as a mule on fisstech and allow me to assist you!” _

_ “Would you lower your fucking voice? My head is splitting.” _

_ “...” _

_ “Sorry.” _

_ “It’s quite alright. I apologize for raising my volume to an uncomfortable level. Is there anything else I can do to help?” _

_ “... you’re a bastard.” _

_ “This has been well-documented, Geralt. Now answer the question.” _

_ “I guess having something to ground me… might help.” _

_ “Then I suppose I must condemn you to a hug as your potiony-ness goes away since  _ someone _ forgot to refill their stock of White Honey.” _

_ “Fuck you.” _

The witcher would give anything to talk to his bard again.


	19. Dragon

The second ingredient he required for the hedge witch is a dragon’s scale. One from the belly of the beast, to be precise. A difficult thing to manage, unless one knows about the location of a deceased dragon. Lucky for Geralt, he knows exactly where to look.

It’s with a heavy heart and leaden footsteps that he retraces his path up the mountain. It looks unchanged, despite a decade having passed since his last foray through these foothills; the scrubland brown and green against ashy stone, pale dirt paths leading up and winding around the trees that stick out of cracks in the rock, their roots cascading through the air to grab any morsel of water from the smallest lick of humidity. 

His lungs burn with the dry air the higher he climbs, leaving behind his steed at the very same clearing her predecessor had occupied ten years ago. He passes where the bard had discovered the starving Hirikka, pauses at the location of their campsite. There’s no signs of a fire, not anymore, not after so many years, but the logs are still laid in the formation they’d been placed in. 

He remembers the bard teasing the mage, irritation lining his words. Had the witcher paid more attention, he would have heard the fear underlying the bard’s sentences, the terror of being left behind in such a place. The trepidation and unease towards the relationship the witcher was in the passionate throes of with the mage. That same relationship made him blind to the bard’s distress, equally blind when they crossed the dwarven shortcut. 

It’s since been repaired, the broken boards replaced and the chain reconnected with shiny new links. But the witcher can’t help but take a moment, feet stopping at the edge of the cleaner boards, memory flashing through his mind’s eye of a man he couldn’t save (but didn’t need to). He stops again at the rock on the edge of the cliff, envisioning the bright red doublet that sat beside him, offering him comfort, an escape. 

_ “We could go to the coast.” _

It’s almost like an invisible hand slips into his own, his bare palm cooling and clamming with sweat. The witcher jerks and turns, quickly continuing away from his mistakes. Haunted by his sins.

The cavern is dark, as the sun has set, but that’s no matter to the witcher with cat eyes. The low light that echoes around the darkness, the moonlight pale and faint, is all he needs to see the decaying corpse that fills the cave with a pungent stink. The scales of the dragon glitter dully, viscera and rot coating their shiny surfaces. 

The one he pulls from the mess is red, as red as the scaled doublet he remembers, and he nearly drops it in his haste to escape his past. As he stumbles back, he feels hot breath huff down his neck, ruffling his short hair.

He tilts his head back.

A golden dragon stares him down.


	20. Lost

_ “What are you doing here, Witcher?” _

Borch Three Jackdaws, Villentrenmerth, whispers to him in the way only dragons can. His wings are high and open, a warning and a greeting, and the witcher swallows thickly as he turns to face the magnificent beast.

“I am in need of the scale from the belly of a dragon,” the witcher says plainly. There’s no point in attempting to lie. No falsehood could ever make it past the dragon.

_ “And why do you take it from my mate? She has been dead for over a decade now.” _

“I…” the witcher hesitates, is it not obvious? “I don’t know where else I would acquire one.”

_ “Could you not have attempted to summon me? I would have willingly given you one of my own. They are akin to fingernails on a living dragon, but as precious as gems to a deceased one.” _

The witcher looks down at the dull, red scale in his hand. The hot sting of guilt at the back of his throat begins to rise as his stomach twists uncomfortably, “I… am sorry.”

_ “You might as well keep it, Witcher, for you’ve already removed it.” _ Villentrenmerth looks him up and down, enormous head bobbing slightly,  _ “What do you require this for?” _

The witcher scuffs the toe of his boot on the cave floor, as though he were a petulant child caught with his hand in the honey cakes, “I…” he clears his throat, “I’ve lost someone dear to me. A hedge witch can bring him back, but I require the dragon scale as an ingredient to the spell.”

_ “You wish to perform necromancy.” _

“He wouldn’t be dead if it weren’t for me.”

_ “You’ve lost your way, Witcher. You know what happens to those who are reanimated.” _

“It won’t be the same,” he argues weakly, “I-- I’d make sure he’s good. That he’s healthy and hale and whole again.”

_ “It is not possible to give life to the dead, Geralt. Your bard will not be the same.” _

“I just want him  _ back,” _ the witcher’s voice breaks, “Please, you have to understand. Wouldn’t you want your mate back, if it was possible?” Villentrenmerth gives him a disapproving look but the witcher continues on, “Because it is, and I  _ can _ get him back. The least you can do, if you’re not going to help me, is remain out of my way.”

_ “I am neither hindering you nor stopping you from achieving your goal. I have allowed you the scale of my mate, and that is all you require of me.” _

The witcher’s shoulders slump slightly in relief. The dragon continues speaking:

_ “I only warn you against the heartbreak you will experience if you see this through, Witcher. He will not be the same as you remember him. He will be nothing more than a ghost. A shadow of a bard, of a human. Do you truly desire to do that to him? All for your selfish gain?” _

The witcher scowls and snarls, hurt bleeding into his sentences, defense guarding his words, “It is not selfish of me to want to gift life back to someone I took it from. Someone who did not deserve the death handed to them, ripped from life’s embrace far too soon.”

_ “You are adrift, Geralt. I understand. But you must consider your actions carefully. Think heavily upon who you’re doing this for. You may say it is for your bard, but is it truly? Or is it to assuage your guilt; your remorse for an action of which you are not at fault?” _

The witcher doesn’t answer, keeping his eyes lowered as the words ring true and send the marbles scattering.

_ “I implore you to reconsider, Witcher. For you will be so sorely disappointed if you do not.” _


End file.
